Arizona’s Sean Miller Takes A Shot At UCLA Basketball
Arizona coach Sean Miller takes a swipe at UCLA Basketball and recruit T.J. Leaf and it is the cutest thing ever!
Something is eating Arizona Head Coach Sean Miller. Last night in his post-game conference after the Wildcats beat Bradley, 90-60, he spoke about something that has nothing to do with Arizona basketball.
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If you put the pieces together, as Gary Parrish of CBSSports.com did, you can see that Miller had something to get off of his chest about a certain team with the most NCAA Basketball Championships. The UCLA Basketball team.
Per Parrish, Miller strayed from talking about his win to address a team 500 miles west, their recruits and lack of attendance.
"As a young kid, why would you ever want to come to a program or a place where nobody comes to the game?"
Now Miller might have a valid reason to be bitter. His 2016 recruiting class is not coming together as planned. Currently, Arizona’s 2016 class is outside the top 50 per 247 Sports Composite team rankings.
UCLA Bruins
To put into perspective how bad it is for the Wildcats, USC’s recruiting class is ranked higher than Arizona’s.
Miller’s statements seems to be a reaction to 5-star forward T.J. Leaf decomitting from the Wildcats back in August and then committing to the UCLA Basketball team last week. The result has boosted the Bruins to a top 5 class ranking which includes 5-star PG Lonzo Ball, 4-star center Ike Anigbogu and 3-star SG Kobe Parras.
Right now, UCLA Basketball is destroying Arizona in recruiting.
As for the overall state of the programs, Miller might have a valid point. The Wildcats are 2-0, ranked 12th in the nation and had over 14,000 people attend the Bradley game. UCLA is 1-1, not ranked and had just under 6,600 people attend the Cal Poly game at Pauley Pavilion on Sunday night.
"For us, you come here, you have an opportunity to play in front of 14,500. You’ve got the pregame introduction. You have the ZonaZoo. It feels like a college basketball game."
To be fair, Arizona Basketball is possibly the biggest draw in Tucson, Arizona. In Los Angeles, the second most populated city in the country, there are endless amounts of entertainment one can partake in, so forgive the lack of attendance Mr. Miller.
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Additionally (and admittedly), things are a little polarizing with the UCLA Basketball program and their fans, but in Head Coach Steve Alford‘s third year, things are looking up after two straight Sweet 16 appearances and an upswing in recruiting.
In his previous six seasons at Arizona, Miller has not gotten past the Elite Eight in the NCAA Tournament. With all the recruits, talent and conference success he has attained, Arizona is still irrelevant on the national level.
So going back to his shot at Leaf and UCLA, I would like to remind Miller why a recruit would choose UCLA over Arizona: Because it’s UCLA, not Arizona.
Additionally, there are 11 reasons why a recruit would choose UCLA Basketball over Arizona… Those 11 banners hanging in Pauley Pavilion.
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At least if a recruit chooses Arizona, they can look up at that ONE banner the Wildcats have.